1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to information providing systems that provide users of terminals with digital information representing texts and pictures. This application is based on patent application No. Hei 9-236565 filed in Japan, the content of which is incorporated herein by reference.
2. Description of the Related Art
FIG. 19 shows an example of the information providing system that provides a user with digital information representing texts and pictures. The information providing system of this example is mainly configured by a terminal 100 and an information storage equipment 200. The terminal 100 has an input unit 101 such as a keyboard, an output unit 102 such as a CRT display and/or a speaker, an information request unit 103 and an information output unit 104. The information storage equipment 200 is configured by an information management unit 201 and an information construction unit 202.
In FIG. 19, when the user manipulates the input unit 101 to request obtainment of information, the information request unit 103 of the terminal 100 requests the information storage equipment 200 to provide desired information. In the information storage equipment 200, the information construction unit 202 extracts digital information suited to the aforementioned request from the information management unit 201. Herein, the information construction unit 202 directly provides the information request unit 103 of the terminal 100 with the digital information. Or, the information construction unit 202 synthesizes (or aligns) the digital information to suit a prescribed format, so that the synthesized digital information is supplied to the information request unit 103. Thus, the information request unit 103 obtains the digital information, which is then sent to the information output unit 104. Thus, the information output unit 104 outputs the digital information by the output unit 102.
The foregoing information storage equipment 200 can be configured as a single relational database system. In this case, the information construction unit 202 is configured by a SQL interpreter (where "SQL" is an abbreviation for "Structured Query Language") and a VIEW creation function, while the information management unit 201 corresponds to a retrieval function and a database. In addition, the information request unit 103 of the terminal 100 corresponds to a database application program that creates and transmits SQL commands.
Further, it is possible to define the information request unit 103 as WWW browser (where "WWW" is an abbreviation for "World Wide Web") while defining the information storage equipment 200 as WWW server system. Furthermore, it is possible to define the information construction unit 202 and the information management system 201 as database system on the WWW server system. In that case, the foregoing information providing system of FIG. 19 shows a typical type of the known information providing system using the WWW and database.
FIG. 20 shows another example of the information providing system. Different from the foregoing system of FIG. 19, the information providing system of this example is configured using an information storage equipment 300, which is configured by an information storage unit 301 and an information management unit 302. In some case, it is possible to combine the information request unit 103 and the information management unit 302 together. In FIG. 20, it is possible to define the information request unit 103 as "shell" of UNIX while defining the information management unit 302 as UNIX file system, and the information storage unit 301 as text files. In that case, the information providing system of FIG. 20 is capable of making a request to extract a character string, that meets a specific condition, from the text files of the UNIX file system by using a function corresponding to a command on the shell or a "grep" command given from an application program, for example.
Both of the aforementioned information storage equipment 200 and information storage equipment 300 are designed to provide the terminal 100 with digital information in accordance with a certain information providing manner without making a consideration of an output condition (or output conditions) of the terminal 100, wherein the "output condition" represents resolution of a display screen of a display unit corresponding to the output unit 102, for example.
In general, the terminals that provide users with digital information have a variety of configurations, so there are provided a variety of information output conditions. For example, some terminals are equipped with wide screens having high resolution and sound output functions. Other terminals are equipped with small screens having low resolution but are not equipped with sound output functions. The information storage equipment of the aforementioned information providing system is designed to merely provide the terminal with information in accordance with a prescribed manner without making consideration of the aforementioned output conditions. So, the aforementioned information providing systems suffer from problems, which will be described below.
(1) First Problem
In the case where the information storage equipment provides visual information such as texts and pictures in a screen size of 800.times.600 dots, however, if the terminal is equipped with a display unit whose screen size is 640.times.480 dots having low resolution, all of the information cannot be stored in such a small screen size. Therefore, the user must manipulate the display to scroll the screen in order to look at all areas of display data.
The paper of Japanese Patent Application, Publication No. Hei 4-280378 discloses technology for display control of information, wherein windows are automatically corrected in position, size and shape in response to variations of display objects. In this technology, however, if size of the display object exceeds the maximum size of the window, it is necessary for the user to manipulate the display to scroll the window. The above paper contains description that if the display object is too large to be stored in the screen, the display object as a whole can be contracted on the screen. However, if the display object is merely contracted, pictures and characters that an information provider considers important are contracted as well.
(2) Second Problem
In the case of the terminal that cannot provide sound output because hardware does not have a sound device such as a speaker, sound information provided from the information storage equipment is not at all utilized, so that the user cannot notice the fact that the sound information is provided. In the case of the terminal whose display unit is capable of displaying texts but is incapable of displaying pictures, picture information provided from the information storage equipment is not at all utilized, so that the user cannot notice the fact that the picture information is provided.
(3) Third Problem
In the case of the terminal, which has hardware corresponding to the display unit such as CRT display, however, which is short of software functions (or software modules) for the MPEG player and the like (where "MPEG" is an abbreviation for "Motion Picture Experts Group"), it is impossible to provide the user with such information.
Some conventional technology is capable of solving the above problem as follows:
When information on the WWW server is downloaded by the WWW browser of the terminal, if the terminal is short of a required output function (or software module), warning message is displayed on the screen to urge the WWW browser of the terminal to add an output function, which is downloaded from some appropriate system.
Even in the above technology, it is necessary for the user to perform all procedures for download manipulation. So, it cannot be said that everyone can perform those procedures. In addition, the above technology is not applicable to a specific kind of terminals (such as "KIOSK terminals", which are located on the platforms of the railway stations, for example) which do not have a capability of performing addition of the output functions in a dialogue manner.